Posts tagged ‘Tom Hayden’

Coming of age in the wake of Watergate, in the waning days of the Vietnam War, the student movement of the Sixties made a great impression on me, even if only a bit after the fact. Contrary to conventional wisdom, that

generation of activists was still very much on the scene as I began to become politically active myself in the mid-Seventies. And as I learned about that recent history, it was the founding generation of SDS, Students for a Democratic Society, that I identified with most. Tom Hayden, especially

DemocracyNow.org – We speak with Tom Hayden, principal author of the Port Huron statement 50 years ago, the founding document of Students for a Democratic Society (SDS). The statement advocated for participatory democracy and helped launch the student movement of the 1960s. Tens of thousands of copies of the 25,000-word document were printed in booklet form. The youth-led movement changed the very language of politics and its impact is still being felt today. Hayden is a longtime activist and former California state senator.